


Desideratum

by alutiv



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 1895 Words, Anal Sex, Bottom!Sherlock, Established Relationship, Inspired by Fanart, Johnlock Roulette, Light Bondage, M/M, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Post-Reichenbach, top!John
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-27
Updated: 2013-11-27
Packaged: 2018-01-02 19:42:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1060819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alutiv/pseuds/alutiv
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><b>de·sid·er·a·tum</b>, noun: something that is needed or wanted.<br/><i>John has long since ceased wondering how Sherlock nearly always anticipates his unarticulated desires.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Desideratum

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [this fanart](http://locklocked.tumblr.com/post/67460428426/uncensored-version-then) from [be LOCKED](http://locklocked.tumblr.com/).
> 
> The denizens of #antidiogenes provided encouragement, and 3littleowls and Anarfea provided both hand-holding and eagle-eyed beta skills. Any errors in spelling, grammar, or judgment are mine.

_**de·sid·er·a·tum** , noun: something that is needed or wanted._

”You're wearing a tie." Sherlock sits up, the shawl collar of his dressing gown shifting to expose a sliver of bare chest. His damp curls corkscrew in all directions; a post-shower nap on the sofa always leaves them wild. 

"Well spotted." John slumps against the door jamb, tugging at the knot. He leaves the tie loose around his neck. He closes the door, toes off his shoes, and steps into the sitting room. 

"You never wear ties. Why are you wearing a tie?" Sherlock's forehead wrinkles. "No, not just a tie; you're wearing a suit. You don't wear suits to the surgery. You hardly ever wear suits unless you're going to… oh." 

"Yes." John glances at the jacket draped over his arm. "Dr Greene's funeral was today." He drops the jacket over the back of his armchair on his way to the kitchen. 

Sherlock waits a moment before rising off the sofa and following, bare feet soundless on the lino. John has filled the kettle but hasn't set it to boil. He stands motionless, head bowed, hands dangling at his sides. 

Sherlock clears his throat. John lifts his head, shoulders straightening. 

"Did you want me to accompany you?" Sherlock asks. 

"No point." John shakes his head and turns to face him, leaning back on the edge of the worktop. The first button of his white shirt is undone. "You didn't even know him." 

"I wouldn't have been there for him. I would have been there for you." 

"You would have been bored out of your mind." John scrubs a hand over his face, and when he looks at Sherlock again, his lips curve into a half-smile and his eyes narrow, predatory. "It's fine. The funeral's done, and if you had been there, you'd be much more... clothed." He plucks at the belt of Sherlock's dressing gown. 

"Oh," is all Sherlock manages to say before John's mouth is on his. 

The kiss is ravenous, an imperative rather than a request, teeth against lips, hard suction on his tongue. John tangles a hand in Sherlock's black curls, drawing his head down. When Sherlock begins to fold at the knees, John breaks the kiss and catches his arm. 

Sherlock stills, head tilted, eyes half-closed, peering through his lashes. 

John brings his lips back to Sherlock's, licking into his mouth, less brutal now but still demanding. He releases Sherlock's arm and slips his hand inside the dressing gown, skimming his open palm over the tender skin. 

Sherlock arches under his touch, moans into the kiss, and whimpers when John pulls away again. 

Leaning in close enough for his lips to graze Sherlock's ear, John whispers, "Patience." 

Sherlock shivers at the caress of warm breath, closes his eyes, and crosses his wrists behind his back. The dressing gown falls open, exposing all the long, lean lines of his naked body underneath, and John sucks in a sharp breath. 

"Very good," John tells him. He kisses a trail down the proud, elegant neck that bends for him alone, brushes back the silk collar to expose one pale shoulder, and sucks a bruise into the thin skin over the clavicle. Sherlock's knees buckle. John wraps a supporting arm around Sherlock's waist and murmurs, "Bedroom. I'll be there in a moment." 

Sherlock glides out of view. John rolls his sleeves back from his wrists and pushes off the worktop. By the time he enters the bedroom, the dressing gown is a puddle of blue silk on the floor, and Sherlock is in the middle of the bed, balanced on knees and forearms, head held just above his clasped hands. 

Sherlock is breathtaking like this, all that frenetic, kinetic energy concentrated, held in stasis, waiting to be released.  Dark bruises stripe the porcelain skin of his thighs and the curve of his arse, slowly fading tokens of a different day, satisfaction of a different need. John has long since ceased wondering how Sherlock nearly always anticipates his unarticulated desires. 

John unfastens his belt and removes it from the loops; gooseflesh rises on Sherlock's skin at the susurrus of leather sliding over wool. John kneels on the bed behind him, stroking soothing fingertips over the tiny bumps. Sherlock slides his elbows forward to raise his hands from the mattress, wrists together. John's trousers are uncomfortably constricting as he leans forward, his clothed erection rubbing over naked skin, nimble fingers wrapping the belt around Sherlock's wrists. When he retreats, Sherlock cants his hips, and John lays a warning hand on his back. Sherlock takes a ragged breath, lets it out, then settles, motionless. 

Sitting back on his heels, John makes quick work of the button and zip of his trousers, freeing his swollen prick from his pants with a sigh of relief. He reaches between Sherlock's legs to find him hard and dripping onto the sheet. John drags his fingers over the head, gentle now, circling, spreading slick fluid along the shaft, trailing over the delicate skin of the perineum to the puckered entrance. John plants his left hand in the centre of Sherlock's back, a single finger of his right hand pushing inside. Once the clenching sphincters yield to the pressure, he withdraws and rummages in the rumpled bedding at Sherlock's knee. The expected bottle is not there. He hesitates, caught between duty and desire. 

Sherlock raises his head, craning his neck to meet John's concerned gaze with aquamarine irises nearly swallowed by pupil. "John," he says, his voice raw and deep. 

Lust and gratitude and unfathomable _need_ battle for prominence in John's thoughts, only to be blown away like cobwebs when Sherlock breathes, "Please." Sherlock turns back to face the headboard, and John strokes himself, coating his cock and his fingers with his own pre-come. 

It shouldn't be enough, but _should_ is not a word that has much meaning between them. 

Rising up off his heels, John presses his finger inside again, and Sherlock quivers under the hand once more braced in the small of his back. John adds a second finger, crooks them inside to find the sensitive bundle of nerves that makes Sherlock arch his spine and dig his elbows deeper into the mattress. 

"More." 

The vibration of Sherlock's groan travels up John's arm like an electric shock, raising the hairs on the back of his neck. He pulls his fingers free of the pulsing tissue and wraps them around his bobbing prick, squeezing the base because he is closer than he wants to be just yet, slicking the skin as best he can before aligning the glistening head with Sherlock's entrance. The rings of muscle are relaxed, but only just. John buries himself in one unhurried, unrelenting drive and sweat beads across Sherlock's sacrum. 

John's pelvis is tight against Sherlock's buttocks, his cock completely enveloped in the velvety heat of Sherlock's body.  His right hand falls back to Sherlock's hip; fingertip bruises will bloom there later. He withdraws almost completely, then thrusts in once more. He snaps his hips hard and fast, again and again, the room filling with the sound of skin slapping skin, the creaking of the bed frame, Sherlock's moans in counterpoint to John's groans. 

It is almost overwhelming, almost enough to drive out the memory of the afternoon among colleagues, mouthing platitudes to the mourning family of a man he barely knew. John hates funerals, always has. He hates the way they leave him feeling helpless, as if there were something he could have done, something he should have done.  Nothing will ever compare to standing at Sherlock's grave, wondering how he could have failed so utterly, and the brain tumour that killed Dr Greene is far outside John's area of expertise, but the service today still left him thinking entirely too much about the unpredictable fragility of the human body, the thin line between living and dying. 

"John." 

The dark rumble of Sherlock's voice calls him back to the here and now, where death and loss have no place, because he is very much alive; Sherlock is bucking beneath him, breaking their rhythm, and whatever conscious thought is left blurs into so much white noise. John's muscles contract and his bollocks draw up and his eyes squeeze closed, and he gasps open-mouthed as he comes. 

John collapses over Sherlock's back, shirt buttons pressing into his flesh. He curls one arm around Sherlock's ribs, hand splayed across his sternum. His other hand curls around Sherlock's cock, thumb rolling over the glans at the end of each firm pull. Sherlock trembles beneath him, breath harsh and rasping, shuddering into his climax. John nuzzles into the space between Sherlock's shoulder blades, stroking him until the shaking subsides and his breathing grows even. With both arms wrapped around Sherlock's torso, John gently rolls them onto their sides. He unwinds the belt from Sherlock's wrists and tosses it to the floor. Sherlock turns to face him, gazing intently, analysing his features. John takes Sherlock's wrist in his hand and strokes the red marks there with his thumb, frowning slightly. 

"It's fine." Sherlock removes his hand from John's grasp and places it on the back of John's neck, propping his head up on his other arm. "Are you all right?" 

John's eyes crinkle with his smile. "I think I'm meant to ask you that." He turns his head to place a kiss near Sherlock's wrist. 

Sherlock ghosts his fingertips along the line of John's jaw to his mouth, pressing them to his lips. 

"There's the problem," Sherlock says. 

John's brow furrows. "What?" he mumbles into Sherlock's fingers. 

"You're thinking." His solemn expression cracks into a smile. 

John laughs, rolling flat on his back and looking up at the ceiling. "I should just leave that to you, should I?" 

"As you like." Sherlock says with a one-shoulder shrug. 

John's expression grows somber. "You give me too much." 

Sherlock sits up, carding his long fingers through John's golden-grey hair. "I give you what you need. I will always give you what you need." 

John hums, eyes falling closed. 

Sherlock guides John up to sitting, nudges John's legs over the edge of the bed, and kneels behind him. He unbuttons the hopelessly wrinkled shirt, easing John's arms from the sleeves. He kisses the nape of John's neck and inhales John's particular scent, the familiar blend of bergamot and wool and tea and antibacterial cleanser and sweat intensified by exertion. "Right now," he says, "what you need is a shower, and a meal, and a good night's sleep." 

Graceful, as always, Sherlock moves from kneeling behind John to standing in front of him. With his eyes still closed, John cannot see the tender smile that spreads across Sherlock's face. Sherlock takes both of John's hands and tugs him up off the mattress. John's trousers hang loose around his hips, and Sherlock slides them down, crouching to shepherd John through the motions of undressing. When John is completely naked, Sherlock stands and feathers a soft kiss over his lips. John opens his eyes, deep blue and soft, all tension banished for a while. 

Later, after a warm and gentle shower, after takeaway curry and cups of tea, they succumb to exhaustion and crawl into the freshly-made bed. Sherlock falls asleep first, cradled in John's arms, and John follows, a satisfied smile still on his lips.


End file.
